Sensoterra’s Wireless Soil Moisture Sensors
Quick Facts
Company
Sensoterra
Customer Profile
Land Life Company is a global nature restoration organization dedicated to reforesting the world's two billion hectares of degraded land. Operating across three continents with projects in over 25 countries, the company leverages advanced technologies—including drones, satellite imagery and IoT-based soil monitoring—to restore ecosystems efficiently and sustainably. Through its partnership with Sensoterra, Land Life Company enhances water efficiency and optimizes tree growth in some of the world's most challenging environments.
Objectives
- The ability to capture moisture sensor data in remote areas.
- Reduce water usage with smart irrigation timing.
- Integrate sensor data with irrigation systems.
Introduction
Only three percent of the world's water is accessible freshwater. Of that, 70 percent of the freshwater consumed is used in the agricultural industry – the largest consumer of water globally. Monitoring soil moisture levels helps farmers to make effective and smart irrigation decisions. Too much water in the soil leads to waterlogged areas and a potential for plant illness or death, while too little water harms crop growth.
We help find the Goldilocks zone. By setting moisture parameters, users can make sure soil is not too wet or not too dry and define the correct amount of irrigation to get the best yield.
Challenge
Finding the correct balance to grow trees in remote areas
Jurriaan Ruys is the founder of Land Life Company, a nature restoration company with a mission to reforest the world's two billion hectares of degraded land. The organization develops new technologies to restore habitats in parts of the world where nature has been damaged and has leveraged Semtech's LoRa® devices and the LoRaWAN® open protocol in its Internet of Things (IoT) solutions for commercial farms. The company currently has teams on three continents and reforestation projects in over 25 countries.
Land Life Company utilizes drones and satellite imagery to analyze the land during the planning stage. Its innovative 'Cocoon' production process plants trees efficiently and on a large scale.
To ensure the Cocoon provides the optimal amount of water for trees to survive, the company needed a sophisticated moisture sensor system with the ability to provide data in remote areas of the world. Ruys searched the existing market and could not find a suitable, practical solution: wireless, remote, easy to deploy and scalable. He and his team decided to build a solution and Sensoterra was born.
More and more we’re seeing city planners concerned for their water use, as it directly impacts their local communities.
Solution
Scale and Operation Visibility
Sensoterra is a cost-effective, wireless and remote system that offers farmers real-time insight into the soil moisture condition of their crops. Soil is not homogenous – it holds moisture differently in various areas. With low cost, plug and play probes that deploy across large fields, the data becomes more valuable and results in smarter irrigation decisions.
The company utilizes Semtech's LoRa-enabled sensors in its probes and a LoRaWAN-based networking infrastructure provided by Senet, a leading provider of LoRaWAN services platforms that enable IoT connectivity. Sensoterra primarily focused on the North America and European agriculture markets and has deployed over 4,000 sensors and achieved over 720,000 data points since its product launch in 2016. Sensoterra's solutions are now being deployed in Australia, South America and other parts of the world.
Ease of installation is a key feature of Sensoterra's soil moisture system. LoRa-enabled multi depth probe sensors can be installed in a matter of minutes and data is viewable online within an hour after installation. A free app is available for download and can operate on a laptop, tablet or mobile phone. Users have the ability to manage their installations through an easy to use dashboard and an open API is available for data integration.
We are capable of getting the range we need. Users can obtain and access moisture readings from anywhere in the world.
Benefits
Sensoterra Customers Reduce up to 30 percent water usage
Being able to capture soil moisture data remotely was certainly critical for Land Life Company, but Sensoterra soon discovered there was a need for this type of system in agriculture, horticulture and landscaping. For instance, an Idaho potato grower uses Sensoterra's system to manage pivot irrigation. The farmer reduced 30 percent of the farm's water consumption by decreasing irrigation rounds based upon soil moisture metrics.
Recent drought conditions across North America and Europe has led to an uptick in city governments looking to monitor water consumption.
There is a case for these cities. During summer months with low rainfall, costs for irrigation in public parks, golf courses and other green areas skyrockets. However, over-irrigation is still a concern, with dwindling freshwater resources seen in metropolitan areas across the world. By introducing the Sensoterra solution, cities can reduce labor costs and receive a return on investment (ROI) in less than three months as a result of water savings and increased system efficiency.
By operating our solution on Senet’s LoRaWAN networks, we are able to achieve our cost and performance thresholds.
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